LUCY & DESI: DIVORCED!

October 16, 1944

On this date in 1944, Lucille Desiree Ball was granted a divorce from Desiderio Alberto Arnaz in a Los Angeles Superior court. The two had separated on September 6, 1944. Ball’s mother, Desiree “Dede” Ball, was in court to substantiate Lucille’s accusations. Arnaz was then in the military, serving as a Staff Sergeant in the US Army. Ball accused Arnaz of walking out on her and making her “a nervous wreck” interfering with her professional life. Ball requested no alimony. 

The New York Daily News reported that Lucille Ball went directly from the courtroom to work on her ironically titled MGM film Without Love. 

Without Love starred Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy. Filming had begun on October 11 and continued into December 1944.  The film premiered in March 1945 and opened wide in May.  

While Ball’s divorce decree was in the news, Ball’s film Meet The People was finishing its run in cinemas. The film had premiered in Los Angeles on June 1, 1944, and was released nationally on September 7th. 

The Bakersfield Californian used a United Press release that concentrated on their couple’s financial difficulties. It also recalls a previous interview where Ball off-handedly remarked that she was surprised that her marriage had lasted for four years.  The headline (created by the Californian, not UP) called US Army Staff Sergeant Desi Arnaz simply the “Cuban”.  

Another California newspaper printed a longer version of the UP story, with a headline that also reduced Lucille Ball to the color of her hair!  It also includes the fashion note that Ball wore “a bright turquoise coat that set off her hair.” 

The book Desilu by Coyne Sanders and Tom Gilbert states that Lucy and Desi spent the night before the divorce together, voiding the interlocutory decree. In later interviews, Lucille merely said she didn’t sign the final papers. 

Desilu also gives a possible motivation for Ball’s legal action, as well as inferring that it might have been retaliatory and that she never had any intention on finalizing the divorce.  As history tells, the marriage continued until April 1960, when the couple ended their marriage for good.  Although they never reunited and both remarried, they remained lifelong friends and it is said that they were the loves of each others’ lives.